Intimate Portraits of Train Passengers in India

Fascinated by diversity of the people that he encountered while traveling India by train, London-based advertising and editorial photographer Mark Sherratt decided to turn his fellow riders into the subject of a new series. “Once I got into it, I realized that the trains are such a good microcosm of Indian society,” he explained to us over email. “They are full of the rich and poor, the old and young, etc. They are also a great example of how the society works in general. They are often crowded and hectic, but everything seems to work really well. There is always room for one more, and people are always willing to help you out.”

Despite what you might think, finding willing participants for the project wasn’t a problem for Sherratt. “If anything, people were too excited about having their photo taken,” he says. “They would often get off the train and want to pose for me on the platform, so I would then have to try to persuade them to get back on the train to get the pictures that I was really interested in!” The end result? Surprisingly evocative snapshots of travelers captured during a brief pause in their respective journeys. Click through for a selection of our favorite images from Train, and check out Sherratt’s blog for a behind-the-scenes look at more of his work.